Blog Archive

Monday, February 08, 2010

Science and the Supernatural

In school I loved literature for its parables of the human soul, for its magic and mystery of myth and legend -- and excelled in math and physics.

So, regarding the supernatural, I am a skeptic who yearns to believe.

While tossing files last week I came across a newspaper clipping from 7 July, 1999 ( Nicholas D. Kristof, The National Post) discussing a disorder called sleep paralysis.

The article goes a long way toward destroying the anecdotal evidence used to support various claims of alien abductions, flying broomsticks (the primitive tech version,) demon attacks, perhaps even near-death experiences and visitations from the dead.

According to Kristof, sleep paralysis has been reported in many cultures from antiquity.

In China, the condition is described as gui ya - ghost pressure. The Japanese call it kanashibari. In the West Indies: kokma; in Newfoundland: old hag.

The symptoms remain remarkably similar, only the interpretations of the hallucinations vary.

Researchers explain these illusions (of transportation/panic /suffocation /malignant presence) occur when the body is still in REM sleep but the mind had disconnected from dream and is half-awake.

Seems logical. Ah well.

And then I think that science has merely provided an explanation for the conditions of the event. Moreover, at basis, the research remains anecdotal.

Bugger.

And while I don't really believe my dead father walked into my bedroom and spoke to me early one morning, still...

26 comments:

I guess I'm 'skeptical' in that I won't believe just ANY ol' thing.However, I'm just as likely to be skeptical of some scientific 'explanations', unless supported by tons of research and facts.Anything can be explained away. :)

But I think I've seen some things that make our current abilities to define them seem lacking.Maybe you shouldn't be so quick to dismiss the visitation? ;)

I'm skeptical too, even though I believe. But I'm alive because my great grandfather woke my mother up when I was an infant BY SHAKING HER FOOT. He told her to check on me, and I had stopped breathing and was turning blue.

So, you just can't tell me something odd was at work with that incident. I just don't know what it was.

Part of the theme from SCAR is that personal journey means everything. If it comforts me to believe in the "fairies at the bottom of the garden," if it makes me a better person, then I'm going to damn well believe. But if someone else draws comfort from science, then bully for them.

We're all headed to the same destination. Whether you get there by planes, trains, or automobiles could matter less.

I'm a believer. I know there were spirits in the house where I grew up. And a few years ago I was at a writer's retreat and they hired a psychic to come in for career-related readings. During her group meeting she stopped talking and out of the blue turned to me and said, "Do you know your grandmother is with you?" She went on to say that I have my grandmother's name (I do, and I hadn't even told her my name) and that my grandmother told her she had wanted to write but never did. It was weird.

"I'm just as likely to be skeptical of some scientific 'explanations'"

My point exactly, Raine. Perhaps I didn't articulate it clearly.

I may dismiss that particular incident on a loose variation of the explanation outlined in the article - but that still does not mean all such occurrances can be similarily and summarily dismissed.

Written, I know the psychologists' answer to that event - nevertheless, they would have to admit that something beyond the normal motherly instinct, something obviously extra-sensory was operating on that occasion.

"if it makes me a better person, then I'm going to damn well believe."

And that is a valuable point, Betsy.One often lost in such discussions.

SWN,I believe there are some true psychics and an awful lot of frauds.

I like that. Skepticism goes both ways. True. I think sleep paralysis is a fascinating topic in itself. And it's relationship to alien abduction and other such phenomena make it very relavent in our world.

I have to say, I'm probably too skeptical for my own good. I used to believe in things, or even just wanted to, but science kept nudging me & saying, "C'mon now...Really?"That's not to say that all of the mysteries are solved, thankfully!

I'm hard-wired to prefer rational explanations for things, I guess, but I also believe there are a lot of things we don't even understand how to explain yet.

When I read the part about sleep paralysis, I wondered whether it had anything to do with that falling sensation that wakes you (well, me) up in the middle of the night. I've had it ever since I was a child - and I think I could very well believe that I'd just been dropped out of an alien mothership or a fairy boat if I'd grown up internalising a different worldview where that sort of thing could plausibly happen...

I've experienced sleep paralysis a couple of times in my life. I can attest to the strong sense of someone/something in the room. Once, I woke from a dream where this little, furry, terrifying creature was lose in my room. My eyes were open, and I was awake, and I was convinced it was still there. However, as much as I tried, I couldn't call for my parents. It just came out as a croak. I couldn't really breath either. Pretty unnerving. It took about 30 seconds to regain the ability to move.